Accountability - The Myth

I often hear from mangers and partners that accountability in firms is hard to accomplish. Unless it has a government filing or client deadline attached to it, it just doesn’t get done on time or at all. We’ve all been in those meetings or retreats where new initiatives are launched and everyone is assigned their part. Everyone leaves with great ambitions and intentions. Then nothing happens….no one gets called on the missed deadlines, i.e. no one’s held accountable! Once this happens, the trust bond in the team has been broken. This broken trust bond has an effect on productivity and whether or not change can occur in the organization. The culture suffers from miss-trust and lack of leadership.

There is so much talk about how we get our team member to be more accountable. How to have them embrace change and help to innovate. It’s a given that today, with fast paced change in technology and the way we work, it’s essential that teams are able to plan and implement change initiatives.

The myth in all this is that “accountability” is the symptom not the real problem. The core issue is “Alignment”: alignment of company and individual’s values and goals, or more acutely the misalignment of them.

People need to know “WHY” the project is important to the organization,and to them. Typically, the team is given their marching orders and most of the planning time that they do is on the “HOW” not the “WHY”, “WHO” or “What”.

There is an extremely powerful model that helps us understand the team performance dynamic.

The Drexler/Sibbet Team Performance™ Model (see graphic). This model graphically expresses the phases of team development. There is also a set of consulting and assessment tools that go along with this model. Go to www.Grove.com for more information on this tool set.

When team members know the Why, Who, and the What of a project, before moving on to the “doing” phase (How), and are allowed time to connect to their personal goals and values to the project outcomes, accountability is built in.

To overcome the “MYTH of Accountability”, make sure that your team member’s goals and values are aligned with the firms objectives.

For more information on how we can help you and your team create alignment around your goals and initiatives, click here. (Insert link to page on www.growingpeople.mentorplus.com with info on consensus building workshops.